Sasha

He ran.

Away from June. Toward the shot. It didn’t matter. They were the same.

He didn’t understand anything. The stuffiness in his chest. The strange world he’d stumbled into. He hadn’t done anything for June, but she still gave him clothes and a place to sleep. The debt felt heavy on his shoulders. How do I pay it back? What does she want from me? She hadn’t asked for anything. He didn’t know what to do.

He wasn’t afraid. That wasn’t it. He was stronger than her. She couldn’t make him do anything. No one could make him do anything anymore. What he hadn’t expected was the strange feeling in his chest. The confusion. If she didn’t want anything, then what should he do? The other foot would fall someday. She’d ask him to repay the debt.

And then what?

He didn’t know. He didn’t know anything.

The bullet blew it all away.

A glint high on the horizon. Red alerts in the corner of his optic HUD. He shifted, subtly. The bullet buzzed by, close enough to stir his hair.

In that moment, he remembered. This is what I was built for.

A small red triangle alerted him to a second shot. He darted to the side. A bullet chipped the concrete behind him. Pedestrians screamed and fled around him. Alone, he chased onward, eyes upward, searching the tops of the buildings ahead of him.

Faintly, behind him, June shouted, “Sasha!”

He sped up. He didn’t need her. This was something he could take care of alone.

Another red triangle. He snapped his head in its direction. There!

Ahead, to his right, a small gap opened between two buildings, barely wide enough to be an alley. He threw himself into the space, back to the wall. Quickly, he leaned out and glanced back. About twelve stories tall, a chipped and worn grayish-blue façade, smallish, dark windows peeked out of the building. Atop the building, fading letters braced by a metal grate spelled out RVS BANK. The shooter was somewhere up there.

A bullet chipped the wall beside his face. Shrapnel flew.

He flinched back, out of the sniper’s sight, and leaned against the wall. Eyes half shut, he called back the image from his memory. Faint white light blurred over his pupils as the electronic components in his eyes displayed the image he’d glimpsed earlier. He willed it, and the image zoomed in on the glint he’d caught. The building’s roof came into view. The glint became a blur, the blur became a shadow, the shadow became a man. Between the S and the B, face almost entirely mechanical, eyes concealed behind lenses, a bulky man aimed down the scope of a rifle.

Despite himself, his heart leaped with excitement. They came for me. I knew they would.

He scanned the roof, searching for backup, but the sniper was alone. No one else stood on the roof. Sasha frowned slightly, mood dulled. They’re underestimating me.

It didn’t matter. Once he dealt with their sniper, they’d get serious. He pushed off the wall and ran down the alley, already mapping out the route there. If I stick to the alleys and duck around to the right, he won’t have an angle on me until—

From out of an alley, silver flashed at his neck.

Sasha dropped backward. The knife flashed over his head. He fell onto his hands and kicked his feet up in an impromptu backwards handspring. Mid-flip, he twined his legs around the attacker’s arm and threw himself into the flip, pulling the attacker’s arm with him.

The attacker didn’t stagger forward. Instead, the arm fell into pieces and spooled out with him. It was too late to change the force of his attack. Caught in his own momentum, he flipped forward and fell onto his face, the pieces of the arm trapped under him.

The second he landed, the broken pieces of the arm came to life. They wriggled under him, cold and hard between him and the asphalt, thin wires binding them together. Sasha jumped up, but too late. The arm moved on its own and wound around his body, so quickly the wire burned against his skin. One arm was caught awkwardly against his body; the other was trapped outside. He slipped and, unable to catch himself with his legs bound, fell back to earth.

With a click, the pieces of arm strung on the wire locked against one another. He struggled against the wire, but the lock was tight. The wire didn’t slip a single centimeter. He grabbed at it with his free hand, but couldn’t even slide a finger under the wire. It bit into the non-metal parts of his body, deep enough to leave marks.

Familiar laughter echoed from above. “It’s been a while, Four-C. Or I suppose you’re just Four, now, aren’t you? Last of your batch, same as me. I knew you’d be the one. Lucky third member of the unlucky fourth batch.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Sasha looked upward, slowly. His eyes narrowed. “Three.”

The tool was both nostalgic and unfamiliar to him. Eyes that had nearly matched his were now hidden behind lenses. His arms, too, were completely new to Sasha, overly long and weirdly sectioned, the one wrapped around him showing off the thin wires that strung it together. Three lounged against the wall, the wires long enough that his arm could easily reach to Sasha. It took three pieces strung in midair to reach him, but there was slack in the pieces, and the dozen-or-so pieces left over were more than enough to bind Sasha. His clothes were strange, too. Tools were often required to wear streetclothes, but Sasha had only ever been giving boring solid-color t-shirts and pants. Three’s tastefully ripped gear, on the other hand, would have made Marly happy.

The tool laughed, other too-long arm bent back on itself to sit his hand on his hips. “It’s been a while, Four. The last time we met, we were both still candidates, weren’t we? Now look at us. I’m a measly tool, and you’re a runaway, marked for death.”

Sasha kicked suddenly, wriggling against the ground. The wires pulled taut and bit into his flesh. The surface of his skin frayed. It hurt, but he couldn’t stop.

One piece of Three’s arm caught on a rock and slipped off the next piece. Lock undone, the wires slipped for just a moment. Sasha sucked in a deep breath, tensed his arm away from his body, and grabbed at the wire with his free hand. Then the wires tightened again, and he flopped back to earth, still bound.

The slack vanished from Three’s arm as Three picked him off the ground. Sasha struggled, uselessly. Three shook his head, almost sad. “You know, I always root for the runaways. When I heard you made a run for it… well, it’s you, Four. We practically grew up together. I taught you how to fight. For the first time, I thought, this one actually has a chance.”

“Then let me go,” Sasha growled.

Three laughed. “Do you want that, Four? Seirios won’t let you walk away. They won’t stop until you’re dead or back in their grasp. If you can’t even beat a failure like me, how will you beat a candidate?”

Sasha glowered at him. He opened his mouth, then shut it. After a moment, he opened it again. “It’s Sasha. Not Four.”

The arm squirmed around him, adjusting its grip. “Gone native already? Alright, then. Sasha. Remind me, Sasha. What was your record against me?”

“Five wins.” He scowled. “Seventeen losses.”

Three’s hand appeared at his neck, and a blade tickled his jugular. “So? Does this make it eighteen?”

Sasha breathed out and released all the tension in his body at once. He dropped out of Three’s grasp and hit the floor.

Three reached for him, but his hand was stuck at the top of the loop that had held Sasha and floundered. Wires tightened. Pieces clicked against each other, fighting the lock. Three cursed and slapped with his other hand. Sasha rolled to the side, and the slap hit asphalt instead. He jumped to his feet and flicked his dagger into his hand.

Three darted backward, untwisting his right arm. It snapped back into place from the shoulder down toward the wrist, each piece clicking into place to form a solid arm. Even without any slack, it reached well past his knees.

As the arm uncoiled, Sasha jumped and aimed a kick at the dagger in his right hand. Too slow. The last piece snapped into place, and Three twitched it out of his reach.

Sasha turned the kick into a spin and pressed on, pushing inside Three’s reach. He jabbed with his dagger. Three’s left hand struck like a snake and deflected his blow downward. A whoosh from behind warned Sasha to the counterattack. He ducked, just in time to avoid a strike from the right arm.

An opening. Sasha darted at Three. He swung once, twice. His knife caught Three’s wire, and he slashed, but only succeeded at drawing Three’s arm toward him.

Three used the tug to slap the flat pieces of his arm at Sasha’s head. Sasha danced backward. Pieces of the other arm struck him from behind. Pain burst out over his shoulders and the back of his skull. He staggered and bent forward at the waist, arms up to protect his head. Another blow, chafing at his frayed skin. The world blurred. Artifacts flashed through his optics.

“You’re too proud to make it as a tool. I called it from the start. When I heard you’d been demoted, the first thing I thought was, I give him a month,” Three said.

“Shut up,” Sasha growled. He charged at Three, low and quick, and launched a flurry of blows.

Three laughed. He backed up one step at a time. His arms flew, a blur, each piece perfectly positioned to block Sasha’s next blow. “Is that all? Come on. Old hat.”

Sasha ducked inside Three’s arms. Blows rained down on his head and shoulders, but he bore them. His dagger flew toward Three’s chest, faster than before, a silver flash.

Three twitched his shoulder. Wire from the base of his arm looped around Sasha’s dagger, metal whooshing over metal. He yanked his dagger back a second before the wire tightened, so close that the wire keened against the blade. Before he could recover, Three thrust his dagger from below, aiming for Sasha’s stomach. He deflected the blow to the side with his left hand, wincing as metal met metal. It didn’t hurt, but a shock rattled up his arm, half-numb, half ache.

A dozen steps behind Three, an empty lot opened up to the right. Sasha narrowed his eyes. Three would have the advantage in the open space. He had to finish it before they reached the lot.

Throwing the dagger up, he caught it in his teeth. He darted at the wall, dug his fingers into the bricks and scrambled up ten feet from sheer momentum. The fingers on his right arm ached, but the silvery fingers of his left arm easily crumbled the mortar beneath them. When his weight began to drag at him, he kicked off the wall, threw himself into a backflip, and plunged at Three, knife-first.

Three smacked him sideways out of the air with a casual backhand. Despite the casual gesture, the force behind it was anything but. Air rushed out of Sasha’s lungs. He hit the wall and bounced. His head spun. Teeth crashed against the knife. He fell toward the ground.

Three spun his fist and smashed him down. “Idiot. I have the advantage in the air.”

The world flickered as his optics rattled. He retched, coughed, and sucked in a ragged breath that tasted like dirt and metal. His back hurt. His chest hurt. His stomach ached endlessly. He blinked and shook his head to settle the static flashing across his vision. Slowly, he pushed himself up. One hand clumsily grabbed the knife.

Three slammed him back down. His fist pressed on the space between Sasha’s shoulder blades, heavy as lead. He leaned in, a gentle smile on his face. “You made it out. That’s better than most. I wanted to see you run away with it, but I guess it ends here.”

His other hand appeared, drifting side to side, almost hypnotic. The dagger glittered in its grasp. “I’ll give you a quick death.”

Sasha gasped a breath. “Mine.”

“Hmm? Oh, the dagger. You shouldn’t leave your things behind.” Three chuckled. He plunged the blade downward.